A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

POPILLIA. PORCIA. 497
part of the policy of the imperial government to with a double I in the Capitoline Fasti, this form is
publish such reports, we may reasonably question the to be preferred. There are no coins to decide tlhe
genuineness of the document. At all events there question; for those which Goltzius has published,
can be no doubt that the acts of Pilate, as they are spurious. The Popillia gens is one of the great
are called, which are extant in Greek (Fabric. plebeian gentes that rose inlto eminence after the
Apocr. vol. i. pp. 237, 2-9, vol. iii. p. 456, &c.), as passing of the Licinian laws, which threw open
well as Ihis two Latin letters to the emperor (Fabric. the consulship to the plebeian order. The first
Apocr. vol. i. p. 298, &c. ), are the productions of member of it who obtained the consulship was AI.
a later age. (Comlp. Winer, Biblisches Real/oe;r- Popillius Laenas, in i. c. 359, and lie was the first
terbuch, art. Pilaties.) plebeian who obtained the honour of a triumph.
PO'NTIUS TELESI'NUS. 1. A Samnite, The only family of the Popillii mentioned iunder
appears to have been appointed general of the the republic, is that of LAENAS: the majority of
Samnite forces in the Social war after the death of the few Popillii, who occur without a surname, and
Poinpaedius Silo. At all events he was at the who are given below, may have belonged to the
head of the Samnite army in B. C. 82, in which same family, and their cognomen is probably omitted
year Carbo and the younger Marius were con- through inadvertence.
suls. Marius and the brother of Telesinus were POPI'LLIUS. 1. T. POPILLUS, a legatus in
besieged in Praeneste by Sulla. Telesinus him- the Roman army engaged in the siege of Capua,
self, at the head of an ariny of 40,000 men, B. c. 211. (Liv. xxvi. 6.)
had marched to the neighbourhood of Praeneste, 2. P. POPILLIUS, one of the three ambassadors
apparently with the intention of relieving the sent to king Syphax in Africa, in B.c.'210. (Liv.
town, but in reality with another object, which xxvii. 4.)
he kept a profound secret. In the dead of the night 3. C. POPILLITUS, surnamed SABELLUS, a Roman
he broke up from his quarters, and marched eques, distinguished himself by his bravery in the
straight upon Rome, which had been left without campaign against the Istri in B. c. 178. (Liv. xli.
any army for its protection. The Samnites were 4.)
upon the point of avenging the many years of op- 4. M. POPILLIUS, one of the ambassadors sent
pression which they had experienced from the to the Aetolians, in B. c. 174. (Liv. xli. 25.)
Romans. Sulla scarcely arrived in time to save 5. P. POPI,LIUS, the son of a freedman, is said
the city. Near the Colline gate the battle was by Cicero to have been condemned for bribery.
fought, the most desperate and bloody of all the (Cic. pro Cluent. 36, 47.)
contests during the civil war. Pontius fell in the POPLI'COLA. [PUBLICOLA.]
fight; his head was cut off, and carried under the POPPAEA SABINA. [SABINA.]
walls of Praeneste, to let the younger Marius POPPAEUS SABI'NUS. [SanINus.]
know that his last hope of succour was gone. POPPAEUS SECUNDUS. [SECUNDUS.]
(Appian, B. C. i. 90-93; Vell. Pat. ii. 27.) POPPAEUS SILVA.'NUS. [SILVANUS.]
2. A brother of the precedinga, commanded the POPPAEUS VOPISCUS. [Voprscus.]
Samnite forces which had been sent to the assistance POPULO'NIA, a surname of Juno among
of the younger Marius, and shared in the defeat of the Romans, by which she seems to have been
the latter by Sulla, and with him took refuge in characterized as the protectress of the whole
Praeneste, where they were besieged by the con- Roman people. This opinion is confirmed by the
queror, B. C. 82. After the defeat of the Samnites fact that in her temple there was a small table,
and the death of the elder Telesinus, which have the symbol of political union. (Macrob. Sat. iii.
been related above, Marius and the younger Tele- 11.) [L. S.]
sinus attempted to escape by a subterraneous pas- PO'RCIA. 1. The sister of Cato Uticensis,
sage, which led from the town into the open country; was brought up with her brother in the house of
but finding that the exit was guarded, they resolved their uncle M. Livius Drusus, as they lost their
to die by one another's hands. Telesinus fell first, parents in childhood. She married L. Domitius
and Malrius accordingly put an end to his own life, Alhenobarbus, vlwho was consul in B. c. 54, and, like
or was stabbed by his slave. (Liv. lEpit. 88; Vell. her brother, one of the leaders of the aristocratical
Pat. ii. 27.) party. We learn from Cicero that she was at
PO'NTIUS TITINIAINUS, the son of Q. Naples in B.C. 49, when her husband was besieged
Titinius, adopted by Pontius, joined Caesar through at Corfinium by Caesar. (Cic. ad Alt. ix. 3.) In
fear, in B. C. 49. (Cic. ad Att. ix. 19. ~ 2.) the following year, B. c. 48, she lost her husband,
PONTUS (flIv'Tos), a personification of the sea, who fell in the battle of Phllarsalia. She herself
is described in the ancient cosmogony as a son of died towards the end of B. c. 46, or the beginning of
Gaea, and as the father of Nereuis, Thaunlas, the next year, alld her funeral 1,palegyric was iroPhorcys, Ceto, and Eurybia, by his own mother. nounced by Cicero, and likewise by M. Varro and
(Hes. Theog. 132, 233, &c.; Apollod. i. 2. ~ 6.) Lollius. (Plut. Cat. 1, 41; Cic. ad Att. xiii. 37,
Hygints (Fub. praef. p. 3, ed. Staveren) calls him 48.)
a soin of Aether and Gaea, and also assigns to him 2. The daughter of Cato Uticensis by his first
somewhat different descendants. [L. S.] wife Atilia. She was married first to M. Bibulus,
POPI'LLIA, was twice married, and had by who was Caesar's colleague in the consulship B. c.
her former husband Q. Lutatius Catulus, by her 59, and to whom she bore three children. Bibusecond C. Julius Caesar Strabo. Her soil Catulus lus died in B. c. 48; and in B. c. 45 she married M.
delivered at funeral oration over her grave, which Brutus, the assassin of Julius Caesar. She inherited
was the first time that this honour had been paid all her father's republican principles, and likewise
to a female at Rome. (Cic. de Orat. ii. 11.) his courage and firmness of will. She induced her
POPI'LLIA GENS, plebeian. In manuscripts husband on the night before the 15th of March to
the name is sometimes written with one 1, and disclose to her the conspiracy against Caesar's life,
sometimes with two; but as it alwvays appears and she is reported to have wounded herself in tihe
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